A brazen all-out attack on the workforce – not a single car must roll off the production line from now on!
Dear friends around the world,
On Friday, 26 June, the German car monopoly Volkswagen announced a brazen programme of cutbacks: 100,000 workers are to be made redundant worldwide and at least four plants are to be closed! The international competition between the car monopolies, which has become a battle of mutual annihilation, is to be fought out on the backs of the workforces. This calls for strikes as the appropriate response from all VW workforces! So far, they have only spoken of plant closures in Germany – but it is perfectly clear that they intend to destroy jobs worldwide. All of this forms part of a general attack on the working class. Yesterday, during a protest outside the factory gates at Audi in Neckarsulm, a total of seven newspaper distributors and representatives of the MLPD were arrested. They have since been released, but the police operation was illegal and was nevertheless carried out by force. This shows how fascist tendencies are on the rise in Germany and that the state apparatus is being deployed in the service of the monopolies to suppress the struggles of workers and revolutionaries. A serious mistake, because now more than ever, we will deal them a defeat. We call on you: please send messages of solidarity – to the entire workforce and, in particular, to our VW colleagues in Germany and the arrested supporters who are at the centre of these attacks.
As you know, the MLPD wholeheartedly supports the coordination of the struggles of automotive workers within the framework of the International Automotive Workers’ Conference. We therefore ask you to put the VW workers in your countries in touch with the IAC’s Coordination Group (ICOG) (icog@iawc.info).
We would also ask you for information on the situation at the VW plants in your countries: has news of the programme of cutbacks reached them? How are the workers reacting, and are there any activities of struggle taking place?
Attached, we are sending you the MLPD’s press release from Saturday in English.
In solidarity and with fighting spirit,
MLPD – Internationalism Department